Pastor's Report on the 2026 LCMS Convention in Phoenix, AZ.

Christ is risen! The Son of God has come back from the dead, and promises that He goes to prepare a place for us with Him in heaven. The sin that had condemned us to death has been defeated. This Gospel is the focus of the Lutheran Church, the message that no matter your sins, no matter how much you have messed up, you are not too far gone for God to forgive you. It is this Gospel, that we are fully forgiven before we can merit or earn righteousness, that the churches of the Missouri Synod proclaim week after week. Last month I went to the Synod Convention that was held in Phoenix, Arizona. It was an eye-opening experience, and one that gave me a new appreciation for how the Synod works to spread this free Gospel to sinners in need of saving.

What is the Synod Convention?

The Missouri Synod, the church body to which Our Savoir Lutheran Church belongs, is a governing body that oversees the theology and practice of the congregations that maintain membership in the Synod. The Missouri Synod is divided into regions, districts, circuits, and congregations. Our Savior Lutheran Church is in the Little Rock North Circuit of the Mid-South District, part of the Central Region of the Missouri Synod.
Every three years, delegates from voting circuits in the Missouri Synod gather together to decide what the Synod leadership will spend time doing. The convention is where the focus and priorities of the Synod are determined by the passage of resolutions. Resolutions always call for some action. They call on people in leadership to do certain things and take actions that further to good that has been done already. One notable resolution called on the Synod to re-instate the Commission on Worship to evaluate new music and give guidance to congregations on choosing hymns. Other resolutions called on the Synod to re-affirm commitment to various domestic and international missions and continue to work to spread the Gospel.
Some resolutions called on the Synod to study topics and produce guidance. These resolutions are given to the CTCR (Commission on Theology and Church Relations), a group made up of LCMS leaders, seminary professors, called church workers, and knowledgeable laymen. The Commission’s job is to provide study documents, opinions, and statements on theological issues. Some issues that the CTCR will be studying in the coming years will be the use of language in online communication (social media, etc.), the public reading of Scripture by lay men and women, and the “pastoral exception” to closed communion.

It wasn’t all about politics and theological issues. A fair amount of time was also spent bringing attention to the activities of the Synod. Presenters from various organizations spoke on the work that they have been doing in conjunction with the Synod. There were international church leaders, people who have received help and support to plant churches domestically, and people representing organizations that do mercy work. The president of WELS (Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Church, the second largest confessional Lutheran body in the US, and one with which we are not in fellowship) spoke about the relationship that has been fostered by President Harrison and himself. A missionary that I knew from my time in seminary spoke about his activities planting a Lutheran church in Italy. A couple that operates a homestead in New Hampshire spoke about the church that they helped plant after discovering the comfort of the pure Gospel as it is expressed in our Lutheran Confessions. A friend of mine from seminary who is now a bishop in the conservative Lutheran church in Norway talked about his work starting a congregation in a remote village and leading his small but growing Lutheran denomination.

Throughout this convention it was made clear that the Synod remains committed to her confessions and Lutheran identity, even in the face of a modern world that remains antagonistic toward public expressions of conservative Christianity. I, for one, give thanks to God for the LCMS and the work that she continues to do, spreading the Gospel and ministering to God’s people through His Sacraments. Christ is risen from the dead, and that fact is behind everything that the LCMS does. The Resurrection of Christ has changed the world, because through it God has redeemed fallen mankind. He carries us on His shoulders, rejoicing, home to Him. Thanks be to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

-Pastor Pope

President Harrison’s report

o Despite challenges, Synod is still the best thing going.
o Best theology, best liturgy.
 Liturgy: not instrumentation, but order of service.
• Divine Service communicates the Gospel.
 The parts of our service are important, not just because they provide structure, but because they are an expression of our theology.
• Gospel is central: Absolution, Introit, Readings, Eucharist all communicate the forgiveness of sins through the death of Christ.
o The ancient songs we sing express the Gospel in ways that the Church has done for centuries

o Synod in decline
 Large cohort of Baby Boomers is passing away
• Not limited to Synod; afflicts all churches in America.
• Inevitable result of having large numbers of older members.
 Yet, we have more young, large families than some other large denominations (United Methodists, Episcopalians, Presbyterian Church USA).
o Synod must be committed to Lutheran doctrine and practice amid increasing polarization.
 We have unique, special, full expression of Truth that all others lack. Evangelicals don’t have it; Rome doesn’t have it. Only confessional Lutheranism fully and comprehensively expresses the Gospel.
 Political world is divided; let us not be divided as well.
• Our congregations must be Lutheran, consciously and without apology.

Convention Essay: Dr. John Bruss

o How do we know the truth about Jesus?
 The Scriptures: the written Word tells us about the Divine Word.
 The Lutheran approach is to let the words of Scripture speak for themselves. We don’t add meanings foreign to Bible, we don’t read them in light of new meanings of words.
 Luther’s “Tower Experience” and the meaning of words.
• At its worst, medieval scholastic theology introduced foreign Aristotelian language and categories to the Bible.
• “Justice of God” – Luther was taught that this refers to God’s formal, active justice: the justice that properly belongs to God as the One who is above all; Luther realized that St. Paul refers to passive righteousness – the justice received by faith of the just who live by faith.
o Formal righteousness does not make man just – it is the faith that receives the righteousness that God declares.
o St. Jerome’s Latin Vulgate chose “justificare” for Greek “δικαιοω”
 Emphasizes transformation, rather than declaration.
 It is the transformation that makes righteous, rather than the faith that receives the transformation.
o Christ Himself is Grace and Truth
 Fulfillment of God’s Truth, but also is Himself that Truth
 Where Moses obscured, Christ reveals.
• Moses’ Law was necessary, but it does not make one righteous; Christ shows Righteousness of God that man trusts in faith.
o What does this mean for us?
 Life belongs only to those who grasp Christ as the Truth.
• He who bears the Truth-giving words gives life
• Apart from Word, can have no Truth nor life
 Christ is the sacrificial performance of forgiveness. The Church delivers that forgiveness, allowing men to grasp the Truth.